“I can’t get my guys to do that,” he said. I responded, “Why not? You say, ‘Do it,’ and they do it.” At least, that’s the way it had always worked in my radio universe. I was seated in the lobby of a hotel in Orlando chatting informally with a group of small- and medium-market program directors.

It was not my intention to put the young guy on the spot and I don’t think that I did. I was addressing the whole group of five, or so. There seemed to be an implied consensus that a PD put forth suggestions which the jocks might or might not take. I can only imagine Mike Payne, Paul Drew, Jim Maddox or any of my former major-market PDs operating that way. I certainly had not.

Successful program directors were not bullying dictators, of course. And, cajoling had its place, certainly. Agreement is good and the best PDs were able to bring about agreement among the air staff. But, there was such a thing as an instruction. Call it an order because that’s what it was.

“We’re getting too long-winded around here, generally. So, the ‘ten-second backsell’ rule is now in effect.” That was not up for discussion. The above “agreement” reference notwithstanding, it was not a democracy. It was a programming department manned by professionals who knew well how to follow instructions and knew why things worked the way they worked.

In one – and only one – jock meeting, one of my guys suggested we take a vote on a particular programming matter. I didn’t have to do a thing. The whole group turned and looked at him as if he had two heads. Following a slight pause, I put forth The Plan. Of course, we discussed it. We went over “what if” and “how come” questions. I took care to get everyone to see the logic. And, everyone did. That’s how it was done.

When issuing an instruction in memo form, particularly with regard to new on-air promotions or programmatic approaches, I would close out with; “If you have any questions, see me or call me, no matter the hour.” And, I meant that. Mine was a 24/7 job. If the station was operating, I was at work no matter where my body happened to be; at home in the middle of the night, at a concert, at the beach or in New York City. Didn’t matter. I was in charge of programming at a major station in a major market and it had to roll right.

“The program director is responsible for everything that goes out on the air from the smallest scratch on a record to the biggest news story,” said Paul Drew. (Note to the post-Boomers: We actually played vinyl records back in olden times and they sometimes got scratched.) That was probably his most overarching lesson to me and it stuck. I had seen him in action. He had amazed even old hands with his thoroughness. And, I’d like to think some of that rubbed off on me. In this case, he was talking “buck stops here” responsibility. Did it go across the air? Ultimately, it was the PD’s responsibility. Jock gone crazy? PD’s gotta handle it. Riot situation? PD’s gotta manage the station’s on-air response.

There were consultants. The best were not micro-managers. Bill Drake, who’ll be the King of All Radio Consultants in my mind for the rest of my life, cajoled and persuaded. This statement is based on conversations that he and I had in later years. To be sure, he was in a position to simply tell local PDs, “This is how we’re gonna do it and that’s that.” And, I’m sure that he had occasion to put his foot down. His business and his reputation were connected to these stations – particularly the RKO stations – after all. But, he knew that schmoozing had its place and was key to bringing about the desired result. Bill Drake got results.

But, there were other authoritative considerations.

Case in point: One night, when I was truly a “junior” in the business, Paul Drew, my PD and a giant in the industry, walked into my studio at KFRC/SanFrancisco, pointed to some commercial copy and asked how the client name was pronounced. I told him. He said no, it was pronounced another way. I persisted because I knew what I was looking at. He insisted it was so-and-so. Finally, I said, “Look, if you want me to say ‘so-and-so,’ I’ll do that. But, it’s ‘such-and-such.’” I was not about to concede a point on which I knew I was totally right. He looked at me rather blankly, turned and left. I continued to pronounce it my way; the right way.

Case in point: At 1580 KDAY/L.A., long before computers became fixtures in air studios, there was always a stack of local newspapers and trade magazines sitting on a counter near the jock. It was there for quick reference. Reference. Jocks, being human, would sometimes become engrossed in the news to the detriment of their on-air performance. So, on one occasion I walked in and simply removed the stack. What followed was UPSET!!! I had expected protest, but their level of expressed unhappiness was far higher than I had predicted. The crew seemed close to mutiny. I’m exaggerating, of course, but it was rather extreme as reactions went. I determined that I’d erred in not using more of a gradient approach; perhaps issuing a stronger warning. I put the stack back in place with the admonition that it was for reference only and could not be allowed to distract or I would remove it again. Deal.

Radio was serious fun. Being a professional radio jock was serious fun. Being a major-station, major-market PD was challenging and serious fun. And, we’re the only ones who really get it.

(Follow me on Twitter @jjsradioblog.)

Sometimes I get annoyed with teens who go around composing or reciting rap lyrics aloud in public places. Then, I have to remind myself that it’s their version of doing essentially the same thing we did with our favorite music: Sing and dream. “How Does It Feel” was one such song back when I attended Alexander Hamilton Junior High School in Cleveland. It was by a local group named the O’Jays.

We never quite did that song justice, but we thought we did, which was enough at the time. This was the type of music that junior high and high school guys “performed” on walks to and from school, on summertime nights under street lamps and in school stairwells, which provided marvelous echo to enhance our harmonies. And, it was along these lines that the O’Jays had gotten started just a few miles away a few years earlier.

“How Does It Feel” never charted, which was quite beside the point from our perspective. A lot of us liked it and, therefore, it was a hit…to us. It was 1963 and the O’Jays would enjoy their first actual charted release later that year with the H.B. Barnum-produced “Lonely Drifter”.

By the spring of 1966, I’d grown used to seeing R&B acts at the Sunday afternoon matinees at Leo’s Casino; acts such as the Four Tops and Gladys Knight & the Pips. Twelve or so blocks up Euclid Avenue was the Music Box, which offered its own Sunday afternoon matinees. That’s where I saw the O’Jays the first time. There were five of them and they were great!

There was no cable TV, no music videos, no digital downloads and scant awareness of national charts. A hit act was any act whose music was played on the radio and that you and your friends liked and agreed upon. Hence, the O’Jays, to us, were stars long before they finally broke nationally with “Back Stabbers” in 1972.

Eddie Levert, an admirer of Mario Lanza, had envisioned himself an opera singer. He had developed his own operatic approach to R&B, hitting soaring, sustained notes that made the girls scream. But, there was a modicum of democracy within the group as I viewed it from the outside: Eddie was not the exclusive lead vocalist. His friend from childhood and fellow group member, Walter Williams, had led on their 1964 release, “Lipstick Traces” and can be heard on “Darlin’, Darlin’ Baby”, among other cuts. And, there was the falsetto of William Powell, first heard by most of us (in Cleveland) on “Oh How You Hurt Me”, also in ’64. 

I actually met Walt and Ed in San Francisco in 1973. I don’t remember exactly how that came about. I recall that we were on the street in North Beach and that it was brief. I got to know them in L.A. a couple of years and numerous hits later. By the time I had begun interviewing them on-air at 1580 KDAY, there were three O’Jays; Eddie, Walt and Sammy Strain, who had spent years as a member of Little Anthony & the Imperials.

These were great on-air interviews because we had fun and a listener could feel it. It was more like having co-hosts than interviewees, particularly when Eddie and I would go at each other, much to the amusement of Walt, in particular. I’d zap Ed, he’d zap me back. I can hear his voice as I type. I’d hit him. He’d deadpan, “Cheap shot.” Then, we’d all roar.

I know I mentioned this in an earlier blog post, but, as the end of KDAY approached, I silently wished for one more O’Jays interview. I never said that aloud. So, there must be a God. One day, about two weeks before we signed it off, our PD, Jack Patterson, told me I had an O’Jays interview coming. Yikes.

For us, it was a “standard” on-air interview; music, back-and-forth “insults” and lots of laughs. After that, I was ready to sign it off.

The last time I saw the guys was years ago in their hotel room. I interviewed them for my website, The R&B Page. This, being for the purposes of biography, was not the same as our on-air encounters, but just as enjoyable. I found out, among other things, that Eddie had played the violin as a child. I resolved to remind him of that from time-to-time.

Subsequent to that interview, I was saddened to learn of the loss of one of his sons – Gerald, whom I had also interviewed for the website and a guy I liked, though we hardly knew each other – then another; Sean. Later, I was heartened to learn that Eddie was back up and running, doing what he does; performing with his lifelong friend, Walt.

One of the reasons I opted for the show biz life was that I wanted to surround myself with interesting and highly-creative people. Eddie and Walt were two of the guys who filled the bill.

(Follow me on Twitter @jjsradioblog.)

There are great entertainers and there are great singers. The two are not necessarily synonymous. I’ve seen and enjoyed marginal singers who were immensely entertaining. I’ve watched highly creative people who bored me to tears in performance. And, there were those who could combine great singing – exceptional vocalizing – with compelling performance; presentation that kept the eyes glued to their every movement and gesture.

Little Anthony was and is such a performer. I had been aware of him since childhood when, in the late 1950s, Little Anthony & the Imperials’ “Tears On My Pillow” became a major hit. His “high falsetto”, as mentioned in descriptions of his style, is really his natural voice. It’s a high-end, very male voice that can push a listener up against the rear wall of whichever venue he plays. It’s that powerful, though I wouldn’t know that for many years.

In the summer of 1965, Little Anthony & the Imperials appeared on a network TV show which I viewed in black & white on one of those 20” portables with rabbit ear antennae perched on a rickety metal roll-about caddy that every family seemed to own. The audio was far from optimal. And, the picture resolution of black & white TV left a lot to be desired. The Imperials were enjoying a string of hits dating back to the previous year. This TV presentation was a performance-type – as opposed to a lip-sync-type – presentation. And, they performed! They connected through black & white technology and a single, three-inch speaker. This was a real feat. And, I’ve never been easy to impress.

By 1973, I was Program Director of KFRC*FM in San Francisco, an automated rock ‘n’ roll oldies station. It was a job I could never quite bring myself to love. But, it had its advantages. Among those was a real education in radio programming under Paul Drew, the prestige of being an executive – albeit at a low level – of the great RKO Radio chain and invitations to performances by artists I had grown up admiring.

Our station gave away tickets to a Little Anthony & the Imperials performance at Sunol Valley Golf Club, south and slightly east of San Francisco. The place was isolated; out in the country. As we approached the clubhouse, I could see the lights. Good. That helped us to find the place. Then the road took a dip. As the car rose back up from the dip, the clubhouse had disappeared in the darkness! Gone. So, we crept along in the dark until we could make out the building, then parked and went inside.

There, by candle-light, Anthony was performing stand-up comedy until the power could be restored. Many lesser entertainers would have sat it out until the electricity came back on and the audience would mostly have understood. This audience was roaring to the comedic antics of a microphone-less singer and enjoying it. I was impressed with this guy already and had not yet heard a single note. With Anthony, it was about performance. A power outage was just an obstacle to be overcome. He overcame.

The lights shortly came back on and the group and band picked it up mid-“Tears On My Pillow”. It was during the remainder of this performance that I came to realize what a powerful singer Anthony was. All of these guys came to sing! Overall, it was a riveting performance; much more than I had anticipated.

Afterward, my companion and I went backstage to meet Anthony and the group and that was that.

A couple of years later I was on the air at 1580 KDAY in L.A. Being in Hollywood and having spent my childhood in theatre, I naturally sought out acting coaches. First, there was Jeff Corey, one of Jack Nicholson’s teachers, followed by David Alexander, who had taught Jack Lemmon. (Mr. Lemmon had come to speak to us and signed my copy of his autobiography. He was a gracious man.)

The program director of a major L.A. Top 40 station invited me to join him at the Playboy Club in Century City to talk about my joining his staff. I met with him, but declined the offer. I was glad I had taken the meeting, however, as Little Anthony & the Imperials were performing at the club that night. Again, they were great. And, again, I went backstage to greet the group. This time, Anthony and I stayed in touch. 

Soon thereafter, I introduced him to David Alexander and he joined the workshop. So, each week we would work on our acting, then repair to a nearby coffee shop and chat for another hour or so with a couple or three fellow actors. Anthony and Linda, his wife, and Jahn, who was not yet my wife, and I socialized a bit, then we drifted.

The last time I saw him in person, I was doing a rather lonely remote from the cloisters of L.A. City Hall, used in countless TV and movie scenes, perched high above the crowd. The occasion was the then-yearly street festival put on by the city. On a stage below, Anthony was performing without the Imperials. He came up to say hello and I was very glad to see him. Years after that, I called him long-distance. He had moved to another city. He seemed glad to hear from me. That, of course, was gratifying. Since then, I’ve seen him in performance on the PBS oldies/doo-wop series. Remarkably, he and the Imperials still have it after more than 50 years.

From early childhood, I longed to be with and among the real artists. That came to pass in my theatrical childhood and continued onward. “Little Anthony” Gourdine was one such person; a real artist.

I knew I’d get the call, but not exactly when. It came at 3AM. Elmer Hill, head of Black Music Promotion at MCA Records, wanted to let me know that he intended to offer Joan a job at the label and wanted to clear it with me first as a courtesy, which I appreciated. He had hinted at it, already. Besides, I knew you didn’t keep a person such as Joan in a position of marginal pay and opportunity forever. I didn’t want to lose her, but I certainly did not want to hold her back in any way. Her job at 1580 KDAY – an important one from my point of view – would never pay much more than she was making at the time no matter how well she carried out her duties. And, Joan Scott was great at her job.

She was not my right hand. She was my right arm. As had been pointed out by someone in the industry who knew both of us; Joan watched my back. I never introduced her as a secretary, though she carried out those duties as well. No. In truth, she was so much more. If I’d been really clever, I might have come up with a more fitting title. But, I settled on Programming Assistant and she seemed OK with it. I can state without equivocation that the department would not have run as it did without a person like her. And, it ran.

I had “inherited” Joan when I re-assumed the programming position from Steve Woods in the very early ‘80s. I don’t know how she came into the job, whether Steve had led the charge to hire her or if our general manager, Gary Price, had. The job carried with it the unenviable and nearly simultaneous responsibilities of handling office duties for both the PD and the GM, though she was mostly a programming person. In any case, I had become the beneficiary.

On a typical day, I’d finish my morning air shift at 10AM. Joan would arrive just before 9. If she didn’t stop in the air studio before my shift ended, I’d see her at 10 in her office adjacent to mine. We’d greet each other and begin.

There would be a quick review of my daily agenda, which she would cheerily deliver: I had to call this person by 10:30. Do I have to? Ye-es. Another person wanted to talk to me about the album promotion he had proposed for the coming weekend. I’d tell Joan to tell the guy that I was good with it on condition that the product be in our hands “by noon tomorrow” or no-go. She would respond that she had already reminded him of the rules. No surprise there. But, she might say, he wanted to talk to me, anyway, and she had told him I’d call him a little later in the morning. She knew what was OK and what was not. There might be more; I was to meet so-and-so for lunch at Martoni’s. I was to review an air-check with one of our jocks mid-afternoon. I was to be at that studio across town late that afternoon to record my narration for the syndicated show that I hosted. And, did I want tickets to the big concert at the Forum in two weeks?

Joan provided the space I needed to actually be a program director. She delivered what is called “exchange in abundance” by consistently going the extra step and by being reliable to a fault.

There was, of course, the priceless bonus of her friendship, which I have to this day and which she extended to my son beginning when he was a very small child. When he was eighteen, she arranged a duel summer internship for him at a PR firm and in the office of a famous entertainer. He subsequently opted not to enter show biz, but he knew a thing or two about it first-hand because of Joan’s thoughtfulness and care.

So, Elmer was on my line in the middle of the night, telling me that he wanted to hire Joan. I told him it was OK under two conditions, both amounting to “treat her right.” The next day I took her to lunch, informed her that she would soon get the call from Elmer; something she already knew. Also, I reminded her that once she departed, her KDAY position would be filled and would thereafter be unavailable. In other words, this was a big step which I recommended that she take. I’m sure she had planned to do that, anyway.

She took it. She was in the business. I would see her on record day in our lobby and across my desk as she pitched her company’s latest priority releases. It was strange at first, but exhilarating. While we couldn’t always give her a “yes,” we rooted for her.

Today, she works for a local politician. I guess that’s show biz of a sort. And, she and I are still members of an exclusive entertainment industry club. This weekend, I’ll hang out with Joan and however many dozens of our old associates gathering for a day in the park.

Having a Joan in one’s life is a bonus that comes with living. If you’re lucky.

(Follow me on Twitter @jjsradioblog.)

Steve said, “I don’t wanna see ‘em. They’re @$$#*!&$.”

Actually, some of them were. But, most weren’t. Most were just doing their jobs, if somewhat less than brilliantly. There were stars among them, however. Just as in other areas of life, some record promotion people were downright stupid. Most were average-to-normal. And, a few were brilliant-to-ingenious. It ran along a gradient scale.

Steve Woods, our 1580 KDAY afternoon drive personality and Music Director, was having a bad hair day and did not care to endure the stupid contingent of the promo brigade. While I sympathized with his emotional dilemma, being at the end of his tether and all, as Program Director I had to insist;

“Woods, these guys are just doing their jobs. And, their jobs include seeing us on record day and presenting their product. Stop and think about it; most of them are not @$$#*!&$. Now, please go upstairs and see them. And, be nice.”

Woods was inherently nice. He calmed down, went upstairs and did his duty as Music Director.

In music radio, promo guys were an indispensible part of the scene. They kept program and music directors and jocks updated as to what was happening in their particular part of the music universe.

As Gary Price, our General Manager, said to me, “It’s their job to make you like them.” That was true. If you don’t like the salesman, you’ll be far less inclined to accept the product. The smarter people among them – there were promo women, too – knew that. Being likeable was part of the turf. This did not entail being a doormat, which wouldn’t make a person likeable. 

Certain promo people had plenty of phrases likely to induce eye-rolls from radio guys. Among them:

“If you don’t play it, it won’t be a hit.”

Truth: If we didn’t play it and it didn’t become a hit, it wasn’t a hit in the first place. Radio – including KDAY – was “forced” onto more records than I care to count. The marketplace would occasionally demand it.

“How will you know if it’s a hit or not if you don’t play it?”

Right. Let’s experiment with my full-time, major-market radio station functioning as your research tool. That’s gonna happen.

“Don’t you want to play good music?”

Well, that would be nice, but I really want to play hit music, which, more often than not, is the same music. Y’know; music that sustains listener interest. Sometimes I even add music that I hate just because those pesky listeners want it.

“Man, if you don’t add it, they’re gonna fire me!”

Do I have to hear that one every week?

On the other hand, there were promo guys who were an absolute pleasure to deal with. One, who was widely acknowledged as second-to-none in the promo field, showed up unannounced in our lobby one day. I was apologetic for not being able to see him that instant! I knew that if he appeared spontaneously on a non-record day, I must be missing something and I wanted to hear about it. I don’t recall the particular emergency at this writing, but whatever he told me made sense. I did as he suggested and he turned out, not surprisingly, to be right. Again.

This was a guy who had once or twice advised that I play a record from another label (he definitely promoted his own product, of course) because he knew that we should; that it would be to our programming advantage. I did and it was.

That was the key that the smarter guys totally got: Help me to be a winner – to be a successful radio programmer – and you’ll stand to gain. I’ll listen to you. You won’t be subject to the rules, which are designed to hold down the noise. If you are not part of the noise, you’ll be subject to very few rules, if any. 

Dazzling me with brilliance wouldn’t hurt. The same man referred to above once called me at 4 in the afternoon to thank me for increasing rotation on one of his label’s priority songs of the time. I had not announced the upgrade as there was no reason to. Jon Badeaux, our Music Director in my second PDship at KDAY, and I had adjusted rotational categories about ten that morning. He, Promo Man Extraordinaire, had simply listened and noticed. In my decades of experience, he’s the only one who ever did that.

There were other really smart and creative promo people. But, let’s get to the fun stuff:

These guys had promo budgets. Hence, radio jocks and PDs attended concerts, rode in limousines, and ate and drank (often too much) like royalty. That was the L.A. scene in the ‘70s and ‘80s. In later years, radio broadcast companies attempted to impose stringent rules that we simply didn’t have to contend with. This, in order to avoid accusations of payola-taking. Frankly, it’s absurd to consider that a lunch or a dinner, be it ever so lavish, would induce a major-market radio exec to play a record on-air. Influence? Of course. All the above was meant to influence. Casual conversation and ads in trade publications influence.

Above all, life-long friendships were formed as we – radio and record people – were part of the same general community. We shared a common language and did many of the same things together.

In a few weeks, I’ll be spend a day with dozens of my old friends in the biz. We’ll talk that stuff, laugh a lot and have a memorable time with the other members of the “club”; the people who know what we feel and who we really are as individuals. We’ll discuss current projects and future plans. I look forward to this.

We keep dreaming. And, doing.

(Follow me on Twitter @jjsradioblog.)

In perusing Facebook yesterday, I came across a post from my old friend and industry colleague, Stephen Campfield. Steve had been a record promo guy when I was at 1580 KDAY/L.A. in the ‘80s. He posted on Facebook a photo of the sign above our Crenshaw Blvd. sales office.

The main KDAY operation was located on a hilltop in Echo Park near downtown Los Angeles, miles from our target listeners, who mostly lived in the area broadly known as South L.A. The Crenshaw office was our outpost right in the ‘hood; in Leimert Park. For a time, I did my Friday morning shows from the window of that office.

KDAY remote broadcasts had their genesis years earlier during my first run as Program Director of the station, about 1978. I’ve gone blank on the cause that we supported. But, I recall that it was done from a very large tent in the parking lot of what was then the Carnation Building on Wilshire Blvd. Today, ironically, it houses Billboard Magazine and related trade publications.

The cause must have been worthy as we were able to recruit all manner of celebrities to man the phone banks and help raise funds. I don’t have the photos in front of me as I type, but Hazel Spears, an ex-girlfriend and “Linda” in the original “Penitentiary” movie, was one of our fund-raisers. My friend Matthew “Stymie” Beard, late of the Little Rascals, was another of our operators.

As this was a first for the station and given that the nature of remote broadcasts includes unknown variables, the mechanics were very carefully worked out by me and our stellar chief engineer, Andy Laird. Andy devised a two-way cue-light system between the remote location and the person manning the board back at the station, where the music and commercials yet resided. He warned that it was not necessarily 100% reliable. It wasn’t. But, we were pro broadcasters and were able to communicate well enough to compensate for any technical shortcomings and keep the show on the road. Or, in the tent.

Practically any PD of that time knew that radio is local, mostly, and that closeness to one’s listenership is desirable. That was particularly true of Black radio. So, I put 2-and-2 together and figured that we should not waste the advantage of having a location right in the community. I went to our General Manager, Gary Price, and pitched the idea of doing my Friday morning show from the sidewalk-level front window of our Crenshaw office. Gary, having come from the programming side of radio, immediately got it and gave his OK. (I should mention that we had done remotes from that location, but not regularly.)

I had to ask our Production Manager and Music Director, Jon Badeaux, if he’d be OK with arriving before sun-up on Friday mornings to run the board from the main studio. Jon, being a hard-core broadcaster and a trouper, was very much up for it. And, so it began.

We had a good time. I’d sit there, doing my regular morning thing, except I’d include shout-outs to commuters passing by in their cars, honking and waving at me.

“Hey, blue Chevy! What’s up, yellow VW?”

I once persuaded, on-air, a gorgeous girl to turn around, park and stop in. She did. School buses would stop in front of me, sometimes. At first, I was stuck in or near my chair. But later, I got a long cord and would thereafter walk out to the bus, board it and chat briefly with a few students, thank the bus driver, and then head back to my window.

And, there were the celebrities: War – the original band – spent an hour with me there one morning. Band member Lee Oskar presented me with a harmonica, which I still have. Bluesman Z.Z. Hill spent time with me on another occasion. He invited me to his show at the Five Torches night club. I took the previously-mentioned gorgeous girl as my date. She was a knock-out! The show was, of course, great. And, as I mentioned in a previous blog (“‘My Guy’ Girls”, posted March 23^rd and accessible via the Archive), I had Mary Wells, the First Lady of Motown – no matter that she was long-departed from the label by then – and Joni Sledge of Sister Sledge on in the same morning. The interaction between the two was marvelous.

We did other notable remote broadcasts including the debut of Jeffrey Osborne’s first solo album from a packed A&M Records sound stage, many community festivals, once from the cloisters at L.A. City Hall, a location that’s constantly used in TV and movies, and others too numerous to bore you with.

When broadcasters get together and talk about their respective exploits – some of which will never be seen in print – other people tend to go blank. If you’re one of the go-blank people, re-read the above. And, imagine.

(Follow me on Twitter @jjsradioblog.)

I broke the format and my program director praised me.

“Anyone else would have just followed the format. You did exactly the right thing.”

I don’t remember exactly what I did right, but it was along these lines: Format, being a pre-planned pattern of on-air events following on-air events – things such as “Music Category ‘A’” followed by “Music Category ‘B’” followed by a commercial stop-set – dictated that I follow a certain order. In this particular case, following the pre-planned order (the format) would have made the station look bad. It would have been akin to using words in poor arrangement. So, not having the time for consultation, I made a decision to follow another order in this case. Of course, it crossed my mind that the PD might disagree with my decision. But, as it happens, he was a sharp guy who recognized it as a good, common-sense move.

Years prior, at 1580 KDAY, I was faced with a similar situation. At the time, we ran two-minute commercial stops. In those pre-computer years, when commercial logs were hand-generated by someone in the Traffic Department who followed general rules, the order of elements in a particular stop fell to the jock on the air. That person would know, or could easily determine, how each spot sounded: Was it straight voice, voice and sound effects, voice over music or a combination thereof? That and length – thirty- or sixty-seconds – determined the running order.

In this particular case, I had to read a live public service announcement (PSA) concerning a certain ethnic group. Per the format cited above, the PSA would have been followed by a certain spot which might have come off as a bad, possibly racist, joke. Neither element, in and of itself, was in poor taste. But, to follow one with the other… So, I opted to switch the order of the spots, thus breaking format, if ever so slightly. Either my PD, Jim Maddox, didn’t hear or notice it or he understood why I ran it that way and agreed it was OK.

Here’s the thing about format (which covers a lot more than the running order of stop-sets): It’s there to service human beings. The human beings who use it – the jocks – should mostly execute it as provided. But, they should never be slaves to it, which is to say it should work for them and, by extension, for the people (human beings) who listen to that station.

A well-conceived format will lend balance and consistency to a station; a “sound” in addition to the music, jingles, promos and so forth.

A PD is already faced with an unavoidability; the listener’s mis-perceptions. That person already “never” hears his current favorite song which you air, roughly, every two hours. And, he hears that song he hates, which you air twice per day, “every hour.” A good and workable format mitigates his mis-perceptions. How? By actually giving him, as a member of a group in general agreement (fans), what he listens for. This is indicated by the fact that he keeps coming back. He receives not-too-much of this, not-too-little of that.

Format services the air personality in other ways. Most of us only seem to be 100% consistent. And that, I would put to you, is mainly because we bring the same voice and speech mannerisms to work with us each day. We know that most days we’re at least OK. Some days we’re absolutely brilliant. Other days we’re so “off” we wish we could simply cut to the close, go home and lock the door.

As a PD, I could hear when one of my jocks was having a bad day; tongue-tied, timing off and so forth. Their solution was to try harder which, unfortunately, would make it worse. My solution: Don’t try so hard.

“You’re having a bad day. It happens. So, for now, don’t reach. If something (great content) just comes to you, fine. Go with it. Otherwise, keep it simple and just do the format. Tomorrow, you’ll be back.”

Worked every time.

(Follow me on Twitter @jjsradioblog.)

I had not met him before, but when he turned up at our back door, I knew who he was. This was Al Green. 

I had just completed my second-to-last air shift at WABQ/Cleveland. My father was there to pick me up. We were about to depart for home when the back doorbell rang. It was Saturday, August 9, 1969, two days before I was scheduled to leave Cleveland headed for Houston and KYOK. 

I recognized him, not because he was famous - he was not, yet - but because I had seen his photo and had watched him perform  ”Back Up Train” at Cleveland’s WHK Auditorium a year or so earlier on a package show, whereon he had appeared as part of a lineup of four or five other acts. So, I invited him in.

I found him to be a bit shy. I introduced him to my father. We made a little small talk, then he handed me a record. It was a 45 single called “One Woman.” I listened to it and liked it. I explained to him that I would be on staff at the station for only one more day and that I didn’t make music decisions, anyway, but that I would leave the record for my program director, Curt Shaw. He thanked me and left. Then, we left.

In Houston we aired “One Woman” but, if memory serves, it mid-charted at best. Another singer, another record, I thought.

One night, our afternoon drive jock, my friend and associate Wash Allen, introduced me to a friend of his from Memphis named Willie Mitchell. I recognized him from his version of the instrumental “Soul Serenade.” It was a brief but pleasant encounter. I was vaguely aware that Willie Mitchell was a producer as well as a musician. I had no way of making the connection at that time, but this was the man who would be key to the future success of Al Green.

In 1971, I played “Tired Of Being Alone” on KFRC/San Francisco. Al Green would have bigger hits, but it’s safe to say this one put him solidly on the map. I loved the song from the first time I played it. It was followed by bigger hits, such as “Let’s Stay Together” and “I’m Still In Love With You.” Those releases made him a headline act and enabled him to play large venues such as Oakland Coliseum, where my wife, Phyllis, and I saw him perform. He was great! This was a long way from WHK Auditorium package shows.

Willie Mitchell’s deft, spot-on production, combined with what Al Green brought, was magic. And, there was a bonus, known only to true Al Green fans; a cut from the “I’m Still In Love With You” album, the one I personally refer to as his “white” album (akin to the Beatles “white” album), called “Love And Happiness.” That song went on to become, for hard-core fans of Al Green, his anthem. It never charted big as a single for the excellent reason that a very large core group had already played the song over and over on the albums they already owned.

Then, something happened. While I was in San Francisco, I saw him again, then again. Those second and third times, something had been lost. The motions were there, but the substance seemed, somehow, to be missing. He was booked to appear once more. As hard as I tend to be on performers, I was nonetheless motivated to make this fourth concert as that first Coliseum performance had been such a great one. I thought, “OK, Al. Make it work this time. Bring back the magic.” He did. He had gotten it back, and then some! 

In 1974, I moved to Los Angeles and 1580 KDAY. At KDAY, one might run into any R&B star of the day somewhere in the building. It was not unusual to encounter Kool & the Gang on the stairwell, George Clinton in the main upstairs hallway or Patti LaBelle near the coffee machine. KDAY was a must-visit for the R&B stars of that time. Naturally, when Al Green came to town, KDAY was one of his stops. I interviewed him at least once on-air. But, my memories of him go more in the direction of up-close conversations away from the microphones.

The one that really sticks was our last chat in the mid-’70s. Someone had thrown an after-work gathering at a place in West Hollywood. Al was there. I had recently read an article in Jet Magazine about him having gone against the advice of his lawyers and insurance people and opening up has ranch near Memphis to a number of underprivileged kids, which I thought was a very nice and generous thing to do. I asked him why he had done it, considering the possible liabilities.

“You got a quarter?”

“Yeah.”

“Lemme have it.”

I handed him a quarter. He placed in in his open palm.

“Now, if you wanted, you could get the quarter back, couldn’t you? Or, I might drop it, right?”

“Yeah.”

Then, he closed his fist tightly around the quarter and shook his hand.

“Now, I really have this quarter. I’m not gonna drop it and you’d have a hard time getting it back, wouldn’t you?”

“Yep.”

Then, tapping his closed fist with the index finger of his other hand, he said;

“I can’t get anything else in.”

One day in the late ’80s, as I read the funnies in the L.A. Times, I came across a quote from a cartoon character noting that; 

“We couldn’t have had the ’70s without Al Green.”

Amen.

(Follow me on Twitter @jjsradioblog.)

I still listen to the radio, sometimes. Often, my inner-puppeteer takes over and makes me say - shout - things into the radio:

“What the #@&% was that?!” or

“Can you actually hear yourself?” or

“Please tell me you’re not that stupid.”

I warn my non-radio friends that I’m no fun to be around when listening to the radio. I listen clinically. It’s the program director in me.

The following may well make me appear as an old coot re-living the “Good Ol’ Days” of radio “when it was a wonderful business.” It was. And, I’m not a coot, thank you. But, things have changed in ways that I really don’t dig. Just bear with me and take it as fact, for the time it takes you to read this, that I know of whence I blog.

A couple of years ago, my nephew, Michael, told me, “I don’t listen to radio, anymore.” We could attribute this to the emergence of digital media; iPod, YouTube and so forth. But, allow me to point out that radio survived TV in the early 1950s when television swept America like wildfire. Radio not only survived, it grew and flourished. And, there were fewer people at that time. So, the “digital took over” argument doesn’t fly with me.

No. Michael doesn’t listen to radio because radio no longer delivers to him what it once did; an experience in entertainment; theatre of the mind; real, human company-in-a-box for that ride to wherever.

What happened? De-regulation. Radio used to have to be responsible first to its local community. In exchange, broadcast companies were allowed, by We The People who own the air, to make money through the selling of advertising. Today, the broadcast companies - actually, custodians and equipment owners - think they own the air. And, We The People have forgotten it’s our property.

This was followed by consolidation, the natural enemy of real competition. As the broadcast corporations grew and swallowed up vast tracts of radio “real estate,” the individual got lost. In order for the mega-corps to manage in their mega-environment, things were tabulated along strictly business lines (though, radio was always and properly a business) to the detriment of a once-upon-a-time radio culture.

It was this culture that had supported, encouraged and given incentive to generations of very smart and talented radio personalities and programmers. It was a culture wherein we were sat-down and taught; “This is what we do. Here’s how we do it. Here’s why we do it this way.” It, via Mike Payne, gave me my first professional radio lesson; “It’s ‘double-u’, not ‘dubya.’”

I should state here that there’s really no end to great radio talent. I hear them. But, they seem not to be properly nurtured. Rather, they’re thrown into a not very well thought-out Big Idea with minimal training, and not by people who actually know. The new people never took the time, apparently, to consult the “old guys” before cutting them loose; to find out what actually made things work so well.

So, we ended up with people who opted to re-invent a perfectly good “wheel.” They felt a need to “innovate” and make changes where no significant change was necessary or warranted. This “innovation” operates with less regard than I hold to be necessary to service a listener and compel him or her to return. And, that’s supposed to be the game; to get as many people as you can to listen as long and often as possible. My nephew no longer feels compelled.

If you read this blog with any regularity, you know about how many times I’ve raved, ad nauseum, about the great stations whereon I’ve graced the airwaves. I’ve raved because those stations worked. KFRC/San Francisco was there for years before my arrival and continued to succeed for years after my departure. 1580 KDAY/Los Angeles succeeded over the long-haul as well. Our core audience eventually moved to the suburbs and that was that. Our signal went, mostly, into South L.A., which has changed a great deal, demographically. But for seventeen straight years it was mostly successful. And, it never lost a dime. 

In later years, I worked part-time at a station with a signal you could probably receive on Jupiter. I’m almost serious. I listened to it in three counties. It had a promotional budget to make rich people cry and a program director who knew what he was doing. But, it was Big Corporate. The PD was hamstrung and brow-beaten daily by a general manager of dubious talent and a consultant in another city. Did I mention it also featured a stupid, unworkable format installed by said genius-in-the-distance? That station folded its tent after a year-and-a-half. QED.

What would I do if given the opportunity? (Understand; I do not seek such an “opportunity.” Been there, done that. This is simply my way of barking at the radio.) I would bring back the successful actions of the past. Would it sound like KDAY, 1982? No! I also wouldn’t wear the same clothes as back then, for that matter, nor the same haircut, if I still had hair. I would keep the body in shape, however. We live in a different time and listen to different music. My station would reflect that. I could go into detail about the formatic elements and perhaps I will in the furture. 

I’ll tell you this: I would counter-program Big Corprate radio with a vengeance. They can’t turn on a dime. I could. I would have no mercy on the little guys either, for that matter, because I would bring the same “gunslinger” attitude that we brought back in the day; “You’re not us, so you gotta go.” Bang. Of course, they would bring their intention.

It would be quite a game.

(Follow me on Twitter @jjsradioblog)